• WBS academic’s paper wins Academy of Management award
  • Kevin Morrell’s research deemed ‘an exemplary contribution’
  • Paper argues for a push away from evidence-based management
  • Professor Morrell argues for a sophisticated way to discuss research

A Warwick Business School academic has won an Outstanding Article award from the Academy of Management Learning & Education (AMLE).

The research from Kevin Morrell, Professor of Strategy at WBS, was one of only three papers shortlisted, and was a joint runner-up following an extremely close vote.

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(AMLE) is the premier outlet for work on management development. This is an annual award where an expert panel decides on the best paper published in the Journal over the course of a year. Professor Morrell's paper was also an Exemplary contribution – a handful of such papers are invited each year from noteworthy scholars.

"It is a real honour to receive such an award given the standing of the Academy of Management Learning & Education," said the British Academy Mid-Career Fellow Professor Morrell.

“The impact of this paper could be to signal a change in how we talk about research evidence and its relationship to management practice and learning.”

The paper Against Evidence-Based Management, for Management Learning, by Professor Morrell and Mark Learmonth, of Durham University Business School, argues that we need to pursue a sophisticated relationship between management research and practice.

One way in which the paper recommends to achieve this is with a rich and diverse understanding of research ‘evidence’ – this includes learning from approaches from the humanities as well as the sciences.

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Professor Morrell added: “The paper argues that the ‘evidence-based’ language which has colonised both management and politics is too restrictive and overly simplistic.

“We need a richer and more sophisticated way when talking about research which includes insights from the humanities - rather than relying exclusively on 'evidence-based' jargon that apes the methods and language of the harder sciences."

Kevin Morrell is a Professor of Strategy at Warwick Business School; he is also a British Academy Mid-Career Fellow. The research paper is available to read on PDF here. Professor Morrell’s Twitter handle is @ProfKMorrell